Master Bedroom Re-design: Part 1

I have this thing for “projects.” Coupled with a shopping problem, our house is in a constant state of “remodel.” Lucky for me, my husband notices, literally, nothing so I can usually get away with most projects without a discussion…although, he was slightly confused when the demo crew arrived to remodel the kitchen. That one took some explaining.

One of the rooms in our house that hasn’t been “changed” for a few years was our master bedroom. Save for a few new bedding buys, it has basically remained the same for the last five years. I decided it needed an upgrade a few months ago and got to work.

Before Hobby Lobby put chevron stripes on everything, my mom and I had spent a Saturday five years ago creating this accent wall using white cabinet liner paper. At the time, we’d thought it’d be easier than paint. We were wrong. The whole project was a massive pain in the ass. The paper was starting to lift and I knew that this wall needed updating, so I started doing some research on different finishes. I really wanted to avoid painting.

The before pic.

I found this company called Stikwood and became obsessed. Beyond their super cool, informative website, what I loved about Stikwood was: 1) the wood planks are adhesive so no nails damage the wall 2) they’re based in California (yay for shopping “local”) and 3) their wood is reclaimed and sustainably sourced from various locations in the U.S. (making my Katie proud.) All I had to do was pick the right finish. I decided to go with the “Hampton” because of the rest of the white accents in our master and I’m really happy with the decision.

Ordering was easy! The site walks you through figuring out the square feet needed (in the event you’re not a UCLA grad – like me.) All you need to do is measure the width and height of your space and the calculator on their site spits out the amount you need to order. In my case, I needed 120 square feet. Since it was my first time ordering, I was able to use the WELCOME10 coupon and save 10%. I ordered the roller that’s needed for install from them, just to keep it easy. But you could totally find a roller at your local hardware store. The order shipped a day after it was placed and was at my house 3 days later…the yummy smell of fresh pine wafting through the house (in case there was any double that it was real wood.)

It sat in our bedroom overnight. The box says the wood needs to acclimate to its space for 24-48 hours. Ours got about 36 hours before I could no longer contain my need to get it up on the walls. All that was required, tool-wise, was a level, a measuring tape, a pencil and a back saw…(I learned what that was on my morning trip to home depot.)

The super helpful guy at Home Depot recommended renting a power saw after I told him about my project. But as excited as I was for my new wall, I wasn’t willing to lose a limb over it, so I went with the less-aggressive $9.99 back saw and called it a morning… I imagined Tim the Tool Man Taylor yelling “you’ll need more power,” as I walked out of the store with my wimpy saw. I do think it would have been easier with a miter box (learned about that from the guy at Home Depot too) but the width of the planks was 5” and the miter box was only 4” wide so, there you go. That math was easier for me. Go Chapman Panthers.

Me “back sawing.” Pretty sure that’s the technical term for it.

After watching a few of the instructional videos, my “sub-contractor” (ie, Mom) and I got to work. This was the only slightly confusing part of the project. While the website has awesome videos, I do love having written instructions to be able to go back and refer to/stick to my face when I have a question…Stikwood just uses the instructional videos…so if we had a question about something, I was going back to their site to look it up. Not a huge negative. It just felt like an extra step.

Isn’t mom cute?! She’s single, btw.

Once you place the first plank, it’s super easy and you’re basically on your way, laying pieces kind of like a really easy puzzle. And, in my case, the only cuts that needed to be made were at the end of either side of the wall. We tried to lay different size planks to give it a more “random” look. I didn’t want any of the planks to line up from row to row. The cool thing about a reclaimed wall, in my opinion, is the less perfect it looks, the better.

The entire project took about 5 hours between my mom and I. Our ceiling, as it turns out, is not level. So we did need to “rip” the wood to make the top row fit. We used an x-acto knife and it worked well.

Here’s the finished project. I’m so happy with how it turned out. In fact, I’m already plotting what else I can “Stikwood.” Thinking the fireplace or base of our kitchen island could be super cool.

Waiting on a few more pieces to arrive before the big master bedroom reveal (ie, part 2 of this post will be here as soon as Pottery Barn delivers our new bed.)